COUNTERPUNCHER

Why Trump’s Only Strategy Is to Keep Fighting—Win or Lose

Governing was never the plan. The president is only looking for a brawl.

Opinion

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The immediate message from the on-its-a-- White House is about fighting.

Stephen Miller, the new crazy-man Chief of Staff, has earned the job, according to Trump, because he’s a fighter. Trump has publicly offered Dana White, head of the UFC, the press secretary’s podium, and urged him to bring along a bevy of his most audacious fight stars.

You will remember that, as Trump rose from the speaker’s platform, where he had been tackled by his security detail after the assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania, his first words were “fight, fight, fight.”

Trump is a stupid man, but he is keenly attuned to a few personal narratives, among them his playboy swagger, his wealth, and his aggressive pugnacity.

He’s a “counterpuncher,” he often proudly explains. You come at him, and he comes back harder.

There is, of course, not a lot of thought here. Faced with new and exigent circumstances, he’s not convening his brain trust to consider all the various possible ways forward. Rather, he’s reverting to his limited grab bag of responses and identities.

The virtue, in terms of a narrative, is that the fight clarifies the recently muddied storyline. The reality is that Trump is an 80-year-old man who has been publicly rejected and, whether he knows it or not, is in the existential crisis of his life. That’s, of course, not a role he’s interested in or capable of playing. He can’t be washed up and turned out, because he’s a fighter, right?

We know this point in the B-movie: The third act opens with the hero in extremis. But, mirabile dictu, he’s not finished, oh no. Think again.

The Democrats are going to see this moment and think it’s about politics, and governing, and solutions, and consensus. Trump is going to see it as a plot point—all eyes on our protagonist (and if those eyes wander, he’ll do something preposterous—like Stephen Miller—to bring them back).

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The story is: How does Donald Trump, with his back against the wall, emerge from this setback? Not how the Republican Party emerges, or his coalition, or his agenda, but how Donald Trump emerges. And count on it, he’ll emerge more Donald Trump than ever before.

The reality of it is that Donald Trump and the Republican Party are wiped out. But in the narrative, he never gives up; he always comes back; his wiles are limitless; and he’s forever unpredictable; count him out at your own peril.

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The reality of it is that he is incompetent and self-destructive, and you can safely count him out. The narrative of it—and that’s what holds the attention of the public—is that he’s always going to stand up to anyone who is going to try to take him down.

And he’s extremely good at this. Storytellers always tell the stories that have worked for them before.

Stephen Miller is not, in any conventional management structure, a Chief of Staff. Most generously, you might say he’s an advocate rather than a manager. Less generously, he’s the office nutcase—hardly tolerated, widely hated; someone who has somehow, inexplicably, found his place in an organization and become too crazy to get rid of. As a chief operating officer, which is what the Chief of Staff is, his function is to coordinate a large and fractious organization. Miller, in that role, is ridiculous. As a symbol of aggression, total refusal to compromise, belligerence, and bat-s--t crazy extremes, he’s brilliant.

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True, his tenure will return the Trump White House to its natural state of chaos (abated, however briefly, by Susie Wiles’ administrative hand), and, accordingly, it’s a tenure that will be sorely limited (four- or five-months tops, I’d bet) because the organization will revolt against him. But that’s not the point.

On his part, Dana White will surely not take the press secretary job, but that, too, is not the point. Trump, the simple machine—the dumb-a-- machine—is merely making the one-for-one correlation between the Ultimate Fighting Championship guy and his White House. Point made.

It’s simple. Trump against them. All he has to do is shift the onus of leadership onto the Democrats or put the onus on them for frustrating his leadership. They’re responsible for f--king things up, and he’s fighting them.

Trump has, with a little critical understanding, been removed from power and responsibility. He has no more accountability. He’s free from all conventional demands. He’s unrestrained. Whatever he does, he can count on the Democrats to oppose him. Their opposition then becomes his narrative.

The psychology is that we live in an age of opposition. Refusal is all-powerful, martyrdom is an ultimate state, and your enemy is your identity. Trump was never meant to govern—that is a ridiculous proposition. But there may not be anyone better at p--sing into the tent.

Today, at this very moment, flush from an astounding victory, we can’t imagine Trump coming back. But how many times has that been said? He always comes back. He is that singular and peculiar creature who, defying all humiliation, won’t go away, immune to our contempt. He is, truly, if nothing else—in fact, he is nothing else—a fighter. That’s the Trump story.

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